So it's nice to know that there are a lot of fellow Gleeks out there! Can't wait for the 2nd season to begin this Tuesday.
Here's another show that I've set on our DVR. Food Revolution. Annie was the first person to tell me about this great show. Jamie Oliver really kicks ass - you can tell he's really, genuinely trying to help transform the way we look at and consume food.
Not only is it one of the most entertaining shows on televisions, it's one of the most educational and important. You make an interesting point though, he doesn't go into too much detail about how eating healthy helps. He does, however, graphically show what can happen when people eat poorly - a young boy is on his way to getting diabetes, a young girl is told she only has a handful of years to live because of kidney problems, kids lose family members, etc.
I've been watching them on Hulu... I have been nothing but floored by the series. Maybe there's a little staging and even some fakery going on, but it doesn't dilute the message.
After years of trying to convince my friends that these types of diets will kill you even if you aren't obese, I now find them listening a lot more after watching the shows. Certainly, I would like to hear a little more about the nutritional break down of synthetic food (let's call it what it is) and it's effects on the human body, but I am not sure that's the job or purpose of the show.
I think Jamie's show is bringing to light something that we don't want to think about in this country: What food means to us emotionally.
The "quality", variety and abundance of food in the country is a huge source of American pride. "As American as Baseball and Apple Pie". Most of us think about food emotionally. Birthday? Birthday Cake! Thanksgiving? Turkey! Memorial Day? BBQ! It's completely wrapped up in the way we live, think, celebrate and even identify ourselves. As individual cultures in the US we use food as a descriptive for our culture... Frankly, cuisine is usually ALL we know about different cultures.
So knowing that, I can see why a town that is sooo wrapped up in it's regional food (food which happens to be of the junk variety) would feel quite threatened by an "outsider" coming in to tell them they need to change their food; after all, food is our culture!
I think we need to be easier on the folks of Huntington. They have shown a lot of courage and grace in the face of such sweeping change. These people have had the courage to speak and act for us as a nation... They aren't the only ones who have been sold a bill of goods by major food corporations. For decades these corporations have been telling us that we "deserve a break today", that we "can have it our way", that their food is "corn goodness" and "good for you". They show sugary cereal hanging out in a bowl of hot milk espousing that if your kids only ate that they'd get better grades because they'd be about to concentrate better in class. Blah...
Watch Food, Inc. Read Fast Food Nation. Buy local and for the love of god! If you can't pronounce it, don't eat it! (Unless it's Worchestershire, no one can pronounce that.)
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